Biography:

Biography:

Samuel J. Entrikin was born September 26, 1862 to Thomas and Sarah Jane Cloud Entrikin in Juniata County, Pennsylvania. When his mother died around 1865, a young Entrikin was sent to live with Sarah Entrikin— his aunt and a notable West Chester physician. Schooled in West Chester, Samuel was a printer by trade, yet he pursued many other interests— among them, teaching, mining, farming, and inventing. However, Entrikin is best known as one of West Chester’s locally famous Arctic explorers.

As a young man, Samuel began his career under Philadelphia area printers F. Sharpless Hickman (ca. 1879–85) and Thomas S. Dando (1885–86). After six years, he abandoned the trade to take up teaching in Aiken South Carolina at the SchofieldNormalIndustrialSchool for “colored people.”

By the fall of 1891, Entrikin had moved on to pursue a Science and Engineering education at SwarthmoreCollege. After studying for just a year, Entrikin then joined the Peary relief expedition of 1892 and ventured to the Arctic.

In the coming years, Entrikin traveled to the north twice more—first, as second in command of the Peary Northern Greenland expedition (1893–94) and later as a member of a government-appointed party assigned to measure the height of Mt. St. Elias and other mountain peaks of Alaska (1896–97).

On returning from Mt. St. Elias, Entrikin came across the small Alaskan towns of Dyea and Skaguay, from which originated the famous Dyea and White Pass Trails, respectively. Curious to learn these routes, which led to the Yukon gold fields, Entrikin, with the aid of native Hingit packers, trekked both. For the next four years, Entrikin spent his days between the Alaskan gold country and the western United States coast, namely Seattle and San Francisco, working for the Philadelphia Exploring and Mining Company and the US government. As he was quite unsuccessful in his personal pursuit of gold, Entrikin earned his living as the captain of a steamship that ferried other prospectors. During this period, he married his first wife, San Franciscan Estelle Baker—from whom he separated soon after for reasons unknown.

In 1901, Entrikin returned to the Schofield school in South Carolina, only to resign in 1904 when he accepted a superintendent position at the Arizona Consolidated [copper] Mining Company, near the Mexican border. In 1908, he married widow Sara Scott Buffington and the couple resided in Johnson, Cochise County, Arizona.

Entrikin returned to the Schofield school for a short year in 1910, citing that the Arizona climate was proving detrimental to his health. For similar reasons, the Entrikins left South Carolina for the last time and returned to Samuel’s boyhood home, Chester County, PA where they purchased the old Franklin Miller farm near Pughtown. The Entrikins farmed in Pennsylvania until Samuel procured a management position on a Florida farm.

They moved to Narcossee, Florida in 1914 and there they lived out their remaining days. Samuel made his living as a farmer and ice merchant while spending his free time hunting and devising new contraptions. In 1933 U.S. patent number 629,212 was issued, granting Samuel exclusive rights to his “metal grab or hand.”

After intermittently suffering for a number of years from mental illness (it is unclear exactly how severe her illness was, although at times, she was admitted to an institution), Sara Entrikin passed away of pneumonia in February 1940. Just a little over two years later, Samuel followed, having suffered from stroke-related complications.

Some would classify “Sam” Entrikin as “among the famous and noted residents of West Chester.”[1] Well known in all of Chester County, Samuel J. Entrikin led a well-rounded life. In addition to being a celebrated Arctic explorer, he was a printer, teacher, gold miner, farmer, inventor, and devoted husband.[2]

Collection Scope:

Collection Scope:

This collection documents the years 1870–1941, with the majority of the materials originating between 1892 and 1940. A very incomplete collection, it consists of journals, letters, maps, and other miscellanea, which document small portions of Entrikin’s life. Of particular interest are Entrikin’s Arctic journals and correspondences with other well-known explorers such as R.E. Peary and F.A. Cook, both of whom claim to have been the first to reach the North Pole.

Organization

The Samuel J. Entrikin manuscript collection consists of the following nine series:

Alaska

Arctic Expeditions

Correspondence

Financial

Genealogical data

Inventions

Miscellaneous

Personal Memoranda

The Southwest

Collection Arrangement:

Collection Arrangement:

The series and folders are arranged alphabetically. Within the folders, documents are arranged chronologically, unless otherwise noted.

Note: Series II Arctic Expeditions is divided between boxes 1 and 3. The materials are contextually alike; however the format dissimilarity of the files warrants separate storage. Additionally, the collection contains some oversized materials, which, although they belong to a specific series, are kept separate in an oversized materials folder.

Related Material:

Related Material:

The CCHS also houses Samuel J. Entrikin’s photograph collection, which consists of photos taken throughout Mr. Entrikin’s life. Additionally, the CCHS museum holds several artifacts from Entrikin’s arctic journeys.